The politicization of the Arctic in the beginning of the 21st century : how do the Arctic Ocean states legitimate their new role in the Arctic of melting ice and new opportunities?

Dahl, Justiina (2010)

Tiivistelmä

The aim of research in this study is to explain why the Arctic region is in the beginning of the 21st century under politicization, and how the five Arctic Ocean states participate in it by actively legitimating their new leading role in the governance of the Arctic of melting ice and new opportunities.

The previous politicization that the region underwent after the Cold War and the changed geopolitical framework for the new one are first written open in order to set the scene for analysis, which is done according to relational constructivist analysis. The historical account of the previous politicization of the region legitimates the claim of a new one and connects the study to other research done of the Arctic. It also helps to deepen the analysis from being mere explanation of activities in the Arctic into offering a more comprehensive understanding of the politicization processes taking place in the region.

The theoretical framework of the study constructs of traditional and critical geopolitics and theories of governmentality. It also connects to the constructivist ontology of the study and to theories of legitimacy, which are used as an aid in the research methodology.

The main body of work consists of the identification of legitimation discourses that the five littoral Arctic states use when participating in the construction and validation of their new role and identity in the Arctic at a moment of disrupting continuity that the region is undergoing. These discourses are in the analysis mapped out according to their content into story-lines, generative sorts of narratives that allow the actors to draw upon various discoursive categories to give meaning to phenomena. With the help of these story-lines “a rhetorical topography” of the Arctic constructed by the states in their policies is then created. The research material from which the discourses are mapped out into story-lines consists of the Arctic policies of the five Arctic Ocean states published in years 2008 and 2009.

As the choice of research material and the theoretical framework of the study emphasize the central role of the sovereign states and the western state-system in the controlling of the politicization processes of the Arctic, the situated nature of the knowledge produced in it is acknowledged. This is done in order to avoid barely repeating, and thus validating the legitimation story-lines constructed by the states in their policies and policy proposals under analysis.

The conclusion of the thesis is that all of the five states use similar discourses in the validation of their Arctic identities that can be mapped out into three coherent story-lines. These story-lines are national and international governmentality, security, and science and knowledge. With them the states legitimate the role of the sovereign state as the highest form of political and moral identity in the management of the politicization of the Arctic. The story-lines hence enable the five littoral Arctic states to act in a leading position within the framework of the new politicization of the Arctic, where climate change is opening up new possibilities for development of resource exploitation and navigational opportunities that have not been accessible before in an economically viable way. At the states’ part the politicization constructs mainly of the provisions they are negotiating for themselves in this changed geological and thus geopolitical situation in the Arctic. The states are validating with the construction of the three story-lines their shared claims over the construction of a state-led governance of the politicization of the Arctic, and their will for peaceful cooperation with each other. These claims also legitimate the existence of the power vested in the western state-system and its core concept of sovereignty, which weaken the position and possibilities of influence of non-governmental actors in the new geopolitical region emerging from the frost in the Arctic Ocean. This aspect of the legitimation story-lines is what ultimately sets the two politicizations apart from each other, as the main characteristic of the last one was especially the emergence of non-governmental actors into the center of governance of the region, its environment and natural resources. The last politicization thus proceeded from top-to-bottom, not the other way around as the states are trying to legitimate the case to be this time around when taking part in the new politicization of the region.

At the end of the study the need for ongoing research of the politicization of the Arctic is highlighted and legitimated as the study is recognized not to give a comprehensive picture of the politicization of the Arctic due to the state-centric framework of it and due to the constant and rapid reconstruction of politics in the region. The study can thus be used as a basis for or a part of a more comprehensive analysis of, which story-lines, identities and roles, will during this new politicization become sedimented and entrenched, and into what kind of actions and governance these will lead in the Arctic of the 21st century.